Audio 4:01
Qld police officer says lead was not followed up in Morcombe case

Peter McCutcheonUpdated
Fri 14 Mar 2014, 8:42 AM AEDT

A former Queensland Police officer has raised serious concerns about one of the state's largest and longest criminal investigations, the disappearance of Daniel Morcombe. Serial paedophile Brett Peter Cowan was convicted of his abduction and murder yesterday and is awaiting sentence. Kenneth King was a Queensland Police officer who interviewed Cowan just two weeks after Daniel's disappearance, and says his superiors failed to follow up a clear lead.

Transcript

CHRIS UHLMANN: A former Queensland Police officer has raised serious concerns about one of the state's largest and longest criminal investigations: the disappearance of Daniel Morcombe. It's a case that's gripped the state for more than a decade. In December 2003, 13 year old Daniel Morcombe vanished while waiting to catch a bus on the Sunshine Coast.

Serial paedophile Brett Peter Cowan was convicted of his abduction and murder yesterday and is awaiting sentence.

Kenneth King was a Queensland Police officer who interviewed Cowan just two weeks after Daniel's disappearance and he says his superiors failed to follow up a clear lead.

He's talking here to 7.30's Peter McCutcheon.

KENNETH KING: By the time my enquiries finished on this matter, we had someone who was a known serious child sex offender who resembled one of the COMFITs (Computer Facial Identification Techniques) who'd recently removed his goatee beard.

He had a white vehicle that could've matched one of these white vehicles on the side of the road. And he had a time gap in his alibi that couldn't be explained that put him in close proximity to the missing person at the time they went missing.

To put it in blunt terms, I thought he was a red hot suspect.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: But you're a constable in a very complex case, how do you know investigators didn't do something behind the scenes that you weren't aware of?

KENNETH KING: It's, there can always be enquiries into background and certainly there would no doubt be things done by investigators that I'm not aware of. But, you know, there was a strategy that didn't appear to be fully actioned at the time.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: To what extend though are your criticisms really with the wisdom of hindsight?

KENNETH KING: Look, I think in these matters, I've got no doubt that people in relation to this matter will say, it's easy in hindsight. And I think it's important to move past the personalities of individuals - police officers, investigators. But you have to look at this objectively and say there are systemic problems with the way this was investigated.

There were objective things at the time. This wasn't a case of hindsight where, oh yes, I vaguely recall that person we spoke to. Myself and Dennis Martin were jumping up and down at the time saying, verbally briefing the MIR (Major Incident Room) about the suspect.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: But Brett Peter Cowan was an atypical, a rare type of sex offender in that he acted on impulse; he acted very quickly. From a policing point of view, that makes it very difficult to prove a case against him. And isn't that also one of the reasons why it took so long to make an arrest?

KENNETH KING: Look, I don't think so. Obviously it's a difficult investigation, but you can't not take action because it's unlikely to succeed or you have some view as to how fruitful it will be.

A common saying in the Victoria Police is "failure to search is failure to find" and it sort of underlines in this sort of situation how you've got to make the enquiries and see where they lead.

CHRIS UHLMANN: Former Queensland police officer Kenneth King, speaking to 7.30's Peter McCutcheon.The Queensland Police Service has released a statement responding to the claims, saying during an investigation of this complexity there will always be opposing views within the investigation team.

It goes on to say "this was a thorough investigation and the Queensland Police Service is comfortable with the strategies used".

This morning, the Queensland police commissioner Ian Stewart spoke on Channel Nine. He says the public has a right to ask why Cowan was a free man given his criminal past.

IAN STEWART: Our system of justice is a strong one. There are people who I think manipulate the system very, very well and I think that once the full extent of his previous convictions and what he'd done come out, I think people are quite right to ask that question, and other people will have to answer that.